Hurriyat Conference leader Mirwaiz Umar ready to support India-Pakistan talks

Senior separatist leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq said on Sunday that the separatists were ready to support talks between India and Pakistan provided India accepted Kashmir as a dispute.

Mirwaiz Umar

Senior separatist leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq said on Sunday that the separatists were ready to support talks between India and Pakistan provided India accepted Kashmir as a dispute. Speaking at a seminar organised by the Hurriyat Conference, Farooq, the head of the separatist outfit, said, "We are not against either the people of India or development. If India and Pakistan initiate a dialogue, we are ready to support it, but India must first accept the basic reality that there can be no military solution to the Kashmir dispute". He said the Hurriyat Conference was against India's policies which were presently being implemented in Kashmir. "It is unfortunate that New Delhi has choked all means of peaceful protest in the Valley. Even pro-freedom leaders are not allowed to meet the people. How can ideas come up if all spaces are choked," he asked. Farooq further said that former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had realised that the only possible solution to the Kashmir dispute could be found through a dialogue process. He also demanded that the Indian government should withdraw the bans imposed on different organisations in Kashmir. The Union Home Ministry earlier this year had banned the Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI) and the Yasin Malik-headed Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF).